While Crowley still sees the checkin as a necessary component of Foursquare's service, he believes the real value of location-based services begins after that entry point. "We talk a lot about what's after the checkin," explained Crowley. "What's after, in the first version at least, [is] 'ok, let's do tips.' So, when you check in to some place, we can surface up relevant content that will maybe sway what you order at dinner. Or, let's do the game mechanics that will take the place [of tips] if we don't have any tips at that place. At least you're earning points and collecting badges for the experiences you're having."

That's the Foursquare we now know, but what's in store for the future? Crowley noted that the Foursquare team is busy coding away on a couple products that we can expect by the end of this year or early next year. He sprinkled his chat with a few hints, giving us insight into what's to come. Here's a look at what he discussed.

Customized Recommendations

As the web and mobile continue to get more personalized, we're seeing more and more services tailoring their offerings to individual users — Foursquare is no exception. Crowley discussed the possibility of a smarter algorithm that would make customized recommendations based on a user's checkin history.

"Every checkin should mean something," he stressed. "Foursquare should get smarter every time that you continue to check in. We should be able to offer special deals that you may be interested in and we should be able to offer recommendations for the type of things you should do next."

Crowley discussed a few instances where a customized recommendation system would be useful:

"Based upon these bars that you've been to, these are six other bars you may be interested in."

"Hey, you just touched down in Chicago, you don't know anything about Chicago, but based on your Foursquare history in New York, here are the things you should do while you're here for a couple of days."

We've been hearing a lot about personalized recommendation tools recently. On Tuesday, for example, Bizzy launched a personalized recommendation engine that helps users figure out where to go and what to do based on users with similar interests. We noted that large players, like Foursquare, could easily introduce recommendation tools on top of their services, mitigating the value of startups like Bizzy that are trying to carve a space based on customized local recommendations — it looks like that's a reality we may be seeing sooner than expected.

The Instant Checkin

Crowley made reference to the possibility of one day being able to instantly check in when you enter a familiar establishment:

"The checkin is a little bit of a pain — you've gotta think about Foursquare, you've gotta take your phone out, it takes 15 seconds. On the other end of the spectrum is something that tracks you all the time — I don't think anyone here wants that... So, we've done experiments where when you go into a familiar place, [your phone] should buzz you and say 'Oh, you're at that coffee shop again. Do you wanna check in?' It goes from 20 seconds to like a two-second experience."

He noted that the only barrier to having these features is the need for technology advances: "Problem number one is that GPS isn't good enough. Problem number two is that if you keep that feature on, your battery lasts four hours. So, when GPS gets better and batteries get better, we'll be in good shape."

Brand Discovery

Building upon the idea of a smarter algorithm that would make recommendations based on where you've been, Crowley illustrated a future where brands would also be fused into that experience:

"On our white board, pretty high up is brand discovery. Remember [when] Twitter used to do suggested [users]? That's the idea, but it's based on where you go. Here are some spirits brands you may be interested in, here are some travel brands you may want to follow, here are some nightlife brands or restaurant brands you may want to follow.

"And as brands get better with surfacing content within Foursquare, we'll get better at surfacing that content back up to users."

As it is now, there are very limited ways to discover a brand on Foursquare, so this seems like something that brands can get excited about.

Better Deals and Specials

During the Q&A session, an audience member asked Crowley about how Foursquare is attracting businesses to adopt the platform. He approached the question by discussing common misconceptions about Foursquare specials and discussing the improvements we may see in the near future:

"People think that a lot of our deals are mayor deals, because they get a lot of press and we make a lot noise about that, but 80% of them are [unlocked] if you've checked in once, if you've checked in five times, if you've been here 10 times this month. They're like loyalty cards — so, I think the product is going to evolve into that.

"The mayor specials are fun, but we have a lot of stuff launching, hopefully by the end of the year, maybe early next year, which revisit a lot of the specials — new types of specials, better analytics on them, being able to run more kinds of special at once. That's all feedback we get from working with merchants."

What do you think about these possible changes in the Foursquare experience? How can the service differentiate from Facebook Places, which just announced a slew of new features today?

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